


orange dad fish

by iron_spider



Series: whump 2020 [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Precious Peter Parker, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:48:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28437918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iron_spider/pseuds/iron_spider
Summary: Peter literally smacks him in the face a couple times, albeit gently, and he’s looking at him in wonder, like he’s never seen him before. His eyes are shining, despite his injuries. Tony grabs his hand and holds it against his own chest.“Oh man,” Peter says, looking down at his hand in Tony’s own. “That’s mine.”“Your hand—” Tony says, shaking his head.“Since birth,” Peter says, staring.“Uh, okay,” Tony scoffs, trying to understand what’s happening here. “Let’s get you—shit, out of this glass, away from this—open window you made.”
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: whump 2020 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2024756
Comments: 34
Kudos: 496





	orange dad fish

Tony is innocently living his fucking life when Spider-Man comes crashing through his window. 

He throws himself to the side, because he doesn’t think it’s Spider-Man at first, he just thinks it’s someone attacking the compound, seeking him out with heat vision and trying to eliminate him first. But no, he sees the flash of red and blue and he knows who it is then, and he rushes over despite the danger to his hundred dollar loafers. Glass crunches underneath his feet as he chases after Peter, who only stops rolling once he hits the far wall. 

“Kid,” Tony says, hearing the panic in his own voice as he latches onto Peter’s shoulder. It’s worse than whatever he was thinking, which was already bad, given the method of entry Peter chose, but Tony realizes it’s worse when he sees the kid isn’t even wearing his goddamn mask. 

“Peter,” Tony says, louder now, and he turns him over.

Peter has a giant bruise over his left eye, and there’s a blown blood vessel in his right one. His nose is clearly broken, a cut of dripping blood across the bridge of it. He’s got cuts and bruises all along his chin and his neck, but despite all that horrific shit, he grins at Tony the second he lays eyes on him.

“Tony,” Peter says—no, slurs—and he reaches out and covers Tony’s entire face with his hand. “Real. True, hero—that’s you. Tony Stark, _the_ Tony Stark, the one and only.”

Tony narrows his eyes at him, his heartbeat rattling in his ears. “What the fuck?”

Peter literally smacks him in the face a couple times, albeit gently, and he’s looking at him in wonder, like he’s never seen him before. His eyes are shining, despite his injuries. Tony grabs his hand and holds it against his own chest. 

“Oh man,” Peter says, looking down at his hand in Tony’s own. “That’s mine.”

“Your hand—” Tony says, shaking his head. 

“Since birth,” Peter says, staring.

“Uh, okay,” Tony scoffs, trying to understand what’s happening here. “Let’s get you—shit, out of this glass, away from this—open window you made.”

“I did what?” Peter asks, twisting around as Tony tries to lift him up and out of all the debris. “Who? Huh?”

“And then you gotta tell me what the hell’s going on here,” Tony says, trying to remain calm.

Peter just grunts in response, like it isn’t super important to him, anyway.

Tony is putting the puzzle pieces together in his head, and he looks over his shoulder as soon as he gets Peter to his feet. The night is balmy and seeping in, but nobody follows after the kid. At least not yet, anyway. 

Tony prepares to protect him if anybody does come, though. 

Peter is scrambling around and slip sliding on the floor as Tony pulls him away from the glass, getting a better hold on his waist as he tugs him towards the hallway. He’s unwieldy normally, when he’s not all fucked up, moving around in anxious and excited energy, but right now he’s absolutely impossible. Like a small animal caught in a trap, entirely unaware of the danger he’s in.

“It’s hot,” Peter blurts out, clinging to Tony’s far shoulder with a good amount of his super strength. “Hot in here. Like that really bad song. That I’m not gonna sing.”

It shouldn’t be funny, but Tony scoffs a little bit anyway.

“Okay, who did what to you?” Tony asks, kicking the door open and moving them out into the hallway. He takes one last look over his shoulder, but still, nobody else comes. “Where’s your mask?”

“My what,” Peter says, and then he’s giggling, and if Tony didn’t know any better, he’d think he was drunk. But Peter doesn’t drink, and even if he did, which he doesn’t, he wouldn’t do it on the job. Tony’s fear is getting more stifling, and Peter is slipping and slipping and slipping out of his grasp. He readjusts him, but Peter’s feet scramble like he’s on a goddamn ice skating rink. Tony stops walking for a second and Peter clings to him, trying not to fall on nothing.

“Okay, okay, okay, Pete, Christ—”

“We’re going down, Houston, problem—”

“ _Pete_ ,” Tony asserts, and he grabs him a little more roughly, straightening him out. Peter stops struggling, bopping his head back and forth like he wasn’t just catapulting himself to the ground. 

Tony sighs. “What the hell happened to you, short stuff?” 

“Short, short, me and you, both,” Peter grunts.

“Your mask, c’mon,” Tony tries again, as they make their slow, _very slow_ descent down the hall. “This is important, focus, kid. Did you lose your mask? Did someone take it? How’d you get like this?”

_he’s obviously hurt he’s obviously drugged but by who with what where when how long ago did whoever it was take his mask did they know who he was what the fuck’s happened what’s—_

“Mask, uh, think,” Peter says, and he clicks his tongue a couple times, drumming his fingers on Tony’s shoulder. “Elevator.”

“Huh?” Tony asks, as he tries to hurry them along. “Elevator? Where? Elevator in what building, bud?” He’s gotta get Friday to track him. Maybe she’s already doing that. Hopefully. Holy shit.

“Elevator in front of us,” Peter says, pointing at it and trying to swallow his laughter. “Where are we going? I love this place. This place is great, Tony. Tony. Tony Stark.”

“Jesus, buddy,” Tony says, and it’s not even slightly funny anymore, because it feels so goddamn dire. “Okay. Baby steps. Baby steps for the baby.”

“Is that me?” Peter asks, gently. He looks at his feet like he’s trying to figure out how to work them. Exactly like a toddler would.

“Yup, you're the baby,” Tony says. “Especially right now because babies never know what the hell’s going on and—”

“I know,” Peter scoffs. A few more steps and they’re finally face to face with the elevator, and Tony punches the button to call it. “I know what’s going on. I do.”

“Me too,” Tony says, glancing at him. “What’s going on is someone dosed you with something and you better not be dying, because I’ll be pissed.” The elevator dings and he can feel Peter go a little stiff as they get into it—Tony moves until he can prop Peter against the wall, and he selects the floor for the med bay.

He holds Peter by both shoulders as the elevator doors close, and Peter blinks at him.

“Dying,” Peter says, working his jaw back and forth. “Do not. Don’t. Wanna do that. Not interested. Not—don’t want to, so—I—I decline. With—with respect.” Tony snorts and Peter snorts in reaction and goddamn, he better not be dying. “Wait, you’d be mad? Is that what you said? Sorry, you’re—this channel is like, coming in all—wonky.”

“Channel,” Tony repeats, shaking his head. “Yeah, I like having you around, Webs. You know that.” He thinks about other things to say to add on to that, quippy snappy shit that would normally come out of his mouth unhindered. And yet, that’s all he says.

“Good, nice, yeah, like being around,” Peter says, nodding. He stares off past Tony’s shoulder, and then he pitches forward and collapses into him. “Dying,” he says, arms clutching at Tony’s shoulders. 

“Stop, I was just talking, you’re not—not dying,” Tony says, patting him on the back. Peter makes a little distressed noise and holds him tighter, and Tony holds back tighter in response. The kid has been a priority since the Vulture shit, but he always tries to say he has things under control. He’s an emotional person but not in the way where he’s running around crying and wailing about his injuries. In fact, it’s usually the exact opposite—Peter is constantly getting himself knocked around and he’s always _it’s fine, Tony, it’ll heal!_ or _listen, I’ve had a lot worse!_

So what’s happening right now isn’t helping Tony’s fear get smaller. 

“It’s fine, we’re gonna fix it,” Tony says, gripping the back of Peter’s neck. “We always fix it, huh? That’s what I do, I’m the mechanic.”

“Not a robot,” Peter says, completely muffled into Tony’s shoulder. “Real—real person. Real man. Brain mush. Legs broken.”

The elevator dings on that horrific note, and Tony pulls back to look at him. “Legs not broken,” he says, but he can hear his own doubts, because if anybody was gonna be walking around and fighting and swinging through fucking New York with broken legs, it’d be Peter Parker. “Friday, hold the door—legs not broken, right? Friday? Legs? Not broken?” Tony yells, finally communicating with her like he should have been all along. Maybe his brain is mush, too. 

“ _No, boss. Neither Peter’s legs nor your own are broken. I’m currently running a scan through his system to see what’s ailing him, but this will be a lot less time-consuming once he arrives in the med bay._ ”

“Okay, we are arriving,” Tony says. He takes one look at Peter, eyes even worse now that they’re all red, his face blotchy and tear-stained, and it’s like some kind of internal instinct kicks in, with Tony. “I’m gonna carry you the rest of the way, Pete, no more struggling, huh? Okay? That fine? You’ve clearly dealt with enough shit tonight, I shouldn’t have been making you walk this—”

“Mush brain,” Peter says, nodding at him like he’s saying something else, conveying some deep truth. “Seventeen people. I don’t even know.” He shakes his head and looks a little despairing.

“Yep, yep, okay, we’re going,” Tony says, not even attempting to make sense of it. He bends a little bit and swoops Peter up, arms around his knees and waist, and Peter huffs and seems a little pissy for a second before he lays his head on Tony’s shoulder, exhausted. He’s got glass from the window sticking in him all over, and some of it cuts into Tony’s arms as he hurries out into the hallway.

“Sorry, Fri,” Tony says, listening to Peter mutter about webs and the rain and his feet and heroes and shit. “Sorry, communication skills are failing me, my brain buzzed out when the window broke, is, uh, Helen or somebody on hand—”

“ _Doctor Cho is still here and has been alerted to the situation,_ ” Friday says.

“Someone stabbed me in the neck,” Peter whispers, sounding strangely clear all of a sudden. “All good and fine and punching and kicking whatever, whatever, then all of a sudden— _slam_ —and then. Dead. Brain mush. Mush destroyed. Then I don’t even know, Tony, I don’t even—”

“Jesus Christ,” Tony says, running now, full-out panicking, and Peter makes noises like he’s being hit in the throat every time the jostling jars him.

“Dying,” Peter says. “Like you said. This is it.”

“Stop, you’re not,” Tony says, trying to be faster, trying not to fail at another fucking thing. 

He thinks back to all the time he let the kid dangle—all those messages, the Great Wall of Happy standing between him and Tony when Peter clearly wanted to talk to him, wanted to get to know him, wanted to impress him. Tony knows why he wasted all that time, he knows he’s got this goddamn affliction where he feels unworthy of anybody with a heart like Peter’s, which is why he kept the kid at such a distance. But he wormed his way into Tony’s life anyway, despite Tony’s best efforts, and Tony let him, finally welcomed it, finally allowed himself this father-like role even though he doesn’t deserve it—and most of all Tony wanted to protect him and keep him safe, and now look?

Tony knows everybody, including Peter, would tell him he can’t stop all the bad things that happen in the world, especially all the bad things that happen to Spider-Man, considering the shitty situations he gets himself into. And yet, Tony still wishes he could, and he wears his shame bright and shining whenever Peter is hurt like this. 

He’s a kid. A _good_ kid, and he doesn’t deserve it. 

“You know, you know, you’re like, the orange fish,” Peter says. 

Tony kicks his way into the med bay, where Helen is already waiting for him. 

“Right over here,” she says. 

Tony follows her, and lays Peter down as gently as he can, making sure the kid doesn’t bang his head. Peter reaches up and grabs onto Tony’s hands and holds him there.

“Orange fish?” Tony asks, as Helen starts her work, shining lights into Peter’s eyes. 

“Marlin, in _Finding Nemo_ ,” Peter says, staring at him and blinking when Helen goes for the other eye. “You gotta find me, okay? I’m Nemo and you gotta—you gotta find—just one second—don’t stop looking, gimme—gimme a—” 

And he trails off, promptly passing out, which does absolute wonders for Tony’s mental state. He looks at Helen in a panic, and she shakes her head. 

“We gotta get the suit off of him, grab some of the clothes you keep stocked for little Peter here,” she says, nudging his shoulder. 

Tony stumbles over to the closet, watching Helen grab things out of the cabinet. “I’d rather this one, you know, didn’t die,” Tony says, swallowing hard. “I’d much prefer if this one flourished and thrived, if we could—manage that.”

“Oh, don’t I know it,” Helen says. 

Tony blows out a breath and grabs some of Peter’s clothes, rushing back over to the two of them. Peter is absolutely passed the hell out, and Tony just. Prays. He rarely does that nowadays, or ever, but he finds himself wishing and asking and begging inside his head before he can even stop himself. 

But he doesn’t stop himself. He just helps Helen, diligently, and he keeps praying.

~

“So someone… _roofied_ Spider-Man?” Tony asks, sitting beside the kid, who is snoring up a goddamn storm. He’s got a bunch of butterfly bandages all over his face and neck, and he’s wearing a pair of teletubbie pajamas that Tony got him as a prank a couple months back.

Helen nods, rolling her eyes. She’d just figured it out about two minutes ago, and Tony is still rolling through the footage that Friday provided, in accordance with Karen’s tracking. He could see the guy on some of Peter’s recordings, which he should have fucking asked Friday for immediately, and he’s starting to understand that his mind goes completely blank when there’s something wrong with Peter. Blank, other than _fix this, fix it_. But either way, he wasn’t able to see where the hell the guy went, because he took off into the night right after he stabbed the kid, probably because Peter was sending webs every which goddamn way. He almost got him. Tony wishes he had.

“Dose was absolutely massive,” Helen says. “Needle went right through the suit, so it had to have been something...strong. It was calculated. Anything normal wouldn’t have fazed him, but they gave him enough to knock out an elephant. Kids can die from doses much smaller from this, so we’re lucky he’s—him.”

“Yeah,” Tony says, with a withering sigh. “We are. Thanks, Doc.”

“You know I’ve always got his back,” she says. She gets up, looking the both of them up and down. “You called his aunt, right?” 

“Yeah, Happy’s grabbing her,” Tony says. 

“Alright,” Helen says. “I’m gonna go get some shut eye, just page me if anything changes. He should be out for a bit, but the fluids are flushing it from his system. He’ll be alright.”

“Thanks again, Helen, for real,” Tony says, watching her go. She waves him off and heads out into the hallway, and Tony sighs, sitting back in his seat. Friday’s scans are still projecting next to him, and he’s hunting down this asshole like a bloodhound. He doesn’t know exactly what he wants to do—Peter never wants anybody to get hurt, not even the bad guys, not even the bad guys that hurt _him_ , but this prick was clearly planning something, with his drug of choice. Thankfully, Peter’s mask was still on when the guy ran away, because Karen’s recording only stopped a couple miles from the compound. Peter was suddenly without it on the Stark security cameras, before he swung through the window, so Tony figures they can probably track it down.

Peter twists around in the bed, his brows furrowing a little bit. “Tony, still there…” he mutters, and his hand reaches out in Tony’s direction, fingers stretching.

He’s definitely still asleep, so Tony can appreciate, free of judgment, the fact that Peter’s asking for him in the midst of his stupor. The kid makes him feel valued. Important. In a way that’s been very rare in his life so far—maybe for a little bit, back when he met Harley in Tennessee. 

_Dad brain_. Pepper had said then. Says now, plenty, whenever Peter’s concerned.

“Right here, sleepy,” Tony says, taking his hand. “No concerns, I’m on it, May’s coming, just—relax, dream about—circuit boards, Star Wars, I don’t even know—”

“And I swim and I swim and Iron Man dives and saves Nemo,” Peter mutters, curling onto his side, towards Tony. “Me. Nemo. And me and Tony eat pizza. Pepperoni. Pepper pepper pepper Tony.”

Tony snorts, smiling fondly at him, and he squeezes the kid’s hand. “I’m always gonna find you, Nemo,” he says, rolling his eyes at himself. “Or, in this case. You’re gonna find me.” He scoffs, patting Peter’s hand with his free hand, too. “Who the hell is Dory in this scenario?”

Peter groans a little bit, sucking in a big breath. “Happy,” he says, eyes still closed.

Tony nearly laughs outright. “Yeah,” he says. “That’s—that’s perfect.”

Tony watches Peter settle into a deeper sleep, and he’s pre-planning the Spider-Man and Iron Man team up that they’re gonna venture into when the kid is better. He’s already got the bots out there looking for the mask. 

When did he become the orange dad fish? 

And would he have it any other way?


End file.
